TMS has a variety of uses in the field of medicine and research. Typically, a TMS coil device is used to stimulate a subject's brain non-invasively. The TMS coil in typical operation produces a series of single pulses which stimulate a particular location on or within a subject's brain.
In most non-therapy situations it is important to measure a response from the subject based on the stimulation received. This is particularly important when it comes to mapping brain functions.
A problem exists with the current single pulse stimulation method as a subject's response to the stimulation may begin during subsequent stimulations in a single series of pulses. As many measurement devices are also affected by the stimulation of the coil readings and measurements are either impossible or unreliable during the actual stimulation.
Therefore, there exists a need to reduce the amount of stimulation needed to give to a subject in order to elicit a response, normally described as the motor threshold (MT). The options for limiting the amount of stimulation given, in number of pulses and intensity, is limited using single pulses while still achieving a measureable response from the subject to the stimulation.